


Eight of Cups

by ProwlingThunder



Series: you didn't die this year (I guess that's good enough) [1]
Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, Heartache, Magic, Nopal - Freeform, Spoilers, Stubbornness, pre-game
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-17
Updated: 2019-06-17
Packaged: 2020-05-13 08:57:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19247953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ProwlingThunder/pseuds/ProwlingThunder
Summary: Nopal was quiet, a desert territory with little budding cacti and villages of simple folk who didn't ask him why he was here.





	Eight of Cups

**Author's Note:**

> So, Asra and Faust's birthday was June 13th. I asked my girls for prompts. At first they threw "I may be an idiot, but I'm your idiot." -- which we decided was better off set aside for Julian.  
> Then my girl goes: How bout something with either "You're always on my mind.." or "No one will ever believe us."  
> Me: Oooo. Also ow.  
> Yeah, I bet you can tell which one I went with.
> 
> Two of Cups:  
> The suit in Tarot known as Cups is also referred to as Chalices or Hearts. It represents the emotional and psychic aspects of life -- fantasy, imagination, feelings, love.  
> The Eight of this suit is often used to signify a disappointment, emotional setback, betrayal or injury to the heart.

Nopal was quiet, a desert territory with little budding cacti and villages of simple folk who didn't ask him why he was here, just came by and eyed his hill and his new home with a mixture of bewilderment and awe. Just came by and offered tiny little things, desserts and desert teas, a culture of people who had made something out in the land with nothing.

The house itself was the hardest part, moving out here. Land didn't _belong_ to people, in Nopal. No one could own it. But no one protested when Asra kicked up dust and just moved in, twisting his will against boulders until he could coax them into changing shape. It was hard. Years of pressing his will against reality and he'd never had so much difficulty talking one stone into becoming a three room shelter, rounding off angles and smoothing away sharp shards. It wouldn't last forever; nothing ever did and winds and time did wonders against even the strongest of stones in the desert, but for now it was a strong, sturdy shelter that took every ounce of concentration and magic he possessed to shape into being.

For now it was a good distraction, and it left him no time to think about what and who he had left behind in Vesuvia. It didn't leave him time to think about the red gaze of the ill or the fight he'd had just before he'd left, didn't let him linger on the raw and aching frustrating that he hadn't been able to make them understand why this was so much easier, safer. It wasn't like they were doctors, who could do much more for the people of the city than anything a mage could pull off. But against them... he'd always had trouble getting them to stand aside, hadn't he?

Asra frowned at the bare walls and bare rooms, and stalked outside the empty door frame. Perhaps he could talk some of the yucca trees into gifting him some blades. Perhaps manual labor would exhaust his mind, where magical labor had only distracted him for a time. He couldn't think about them now. They could stay in Vesuvia and he'd stay out here in Nopal where it was safe and their... their... _stubbornness_ couldn't start another argument. He didn't know what they hoped to accomplish.

For now he could drive himself to distraction, and he _would_. And if tomorrow he had finished all his tasks, he'd find something else to make. Right now, though, he needed a bed.

 

Draped loosely over his shoulders, Faust stayed quiet, but her heart bled with his just the same.

 


End file.
